July 20
Greg grabbed us donuts/pastries from Tim Horton’s which was about the only place close to the hotel, and we had them yesterday as well. We were missing all the lovely pastry shops in the previous towns.
We were all packed and went down to check out of the hotel. We got a surprise when checking out when we were told they hadn’t been paid by Fresh Tracks, so we had to pay the $500 plus hotel bill. We had an emergency contact number so Greg called that, but the message said it was only open during their normal business hours. (wow, that’s reassuring in an actual emergency) Fresh Tracks is on west coast time, so it had to wait until later to be sorted out. Greg also sent emails with no response well into business hours. Finally, he got a hold of a supervisor who said she would look into it. Oddly at some point the hotel had reversed the charge on our card, but later put it back on. We were told it would process and Fresh Tracks would reimburse us. Eventually they did the easiest thing, and the hotel reversed the charge once Fresh Tracks proved they had paid them. The supervisor said that hotel has made that mistake before. Not a big deal, but when you’re out touring it was a hassle to deal with.
We waited in the lobby for our guide for the day and were
pleasantly surprised when we saw Andrew come through the door for our Peggy’s
Cove tour. He said he wasn’t supposed to be our guide today, but the boss
reassigned a few things. (I suspect he may have asked if he could do our tour)
They however did not tell him after our tour he was taking us to the airport.
(which explained all the luggage we had to bring with us) He said no problem,
he’d rearrange the tour to end up closer to the airport without coming back to
do the city tour.
York Redoubt was our first stop which is situated on a bluff
overlooking the entrance to Halifax Harbor at Ferguson's Cove. It was
originally constructed in 1793 and was a command center for the local harbor
defense in World War II. It was designated a National Historic Site of Canada
in 1962. It’s now a park with some incredible views.
We continued down the rugged coast and passed through the Terence Bay Provincial Wilderness Area.
OK, if I said yesterday was a picture postcard everywhere you turned, it’s because I hadn’t seen Peggy’s Cove yet. The crashing Atlantic surf (on a calm day) was quite dramatic.
Peggy’s Cove comprises one of the numerous small fishing
communities located around the perimeter of the Chebucto Peninsula. The
community is named after the cove of the same name, a name also shared with
Peggy's Point, immediately to the east of the cove. The village marks the
eastern point of the St. Margaret's Bay.
Peggy’s Point Lighthouse was built in 1915 and remains in
service.
When we came out of the bathroom, we thought Andrew saw us and we motioned we were going to walk about. He was chatting with someone from California, so we took off. We had wandered the area and hit up the gift shop and ran into him as we were coming out. He said he had gotten worried and was checking the bathroom since we never came out. He said, “you mean you already went down there?” I was going to tell you all about it. Greg says, “you can tell us about it now”. He did. Then we drove to the sculpture we passed on the way in, but there was nowhere to park. There still wasn’t anywhere to park, but we said he could circle and if he didn’t find a spot, we’d find him.
Fishermen's Monument at Peggy's Cove, Nova Scotia, Canada by
William Edward deGarthe. In the late 1970s, deGarthe began a ten-year project
to sculpt a "lasting monument to Nova Scotia fishermen" on a 100 ft
granite outcropping behind his Peggy's Cove Home. In 1976 deGarthe invited one
of his students, to help him with the sculpture. They worked together for 5
years. The project was about 80% complete when the artist died in 1983.
The work depicts thirty-two fishermen and their wives and
children enveloped by the wings of the guardian angel St. Elmo. It also
features the image of Peggy, a legendary late-18th century shipwreck survivor
deGarthe believed gave her name to the village. deGarthe bequeathed the
sculpture to the province of Nova Scotia and it can be viewed in a park located
behind his former home.
It was time to head back along the coast towards Halifax. We took a scenic road in one area and got turned around, but finally we got back on track.
We passed by one restaurant and Greg said we could wait, unfortunately everything else we passed was closed (perhaps by Covid) and we weren’t finding anything but pizza places. Andrew said you didn’t come to Nova Scotia to eat pizza and said if we could wait, he’d take us to a favorite place where his family always went for fish and chips. We were starved by the time we got there, but with the timing of our flight to St. John’s it was our lunch and dinner.
We invited him to join us. The food was very good. We continued our almost non-stop conversation exchanging travel stories, talking about places to go next, climate change, nature, politics, covid, religion and just about everything. During one part of the drive, he commented that we must travel well together. I said “oh, we have our moments” and Greg said “yes, we do travel well together”. We are used to close quarters with living in our small Panama condo, the motor coach and cruise cabins. He said he couldn’t imagine traveling with his girlfriend.
It felt like we were leaving an old friend when he dropped us at the airport for our commuter flight to St. John’s.
We have 4 nights here and 3 days full of tours. Tomorrow we are doing Excursion Around the Bay. Fresh Tracks portion ended in Halifax, so I booked the tours through McCarthy's Party.
For larger photos:Peggy’s Cove – Halifax – Day 3 https://photos.app.goo.gl/CU5dHqiu4Ec2vwjL7
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